19 ms·
Remove Richard Stallman
- catacombs 7y agoThis might be the end for rms.
- netfl0 7y agoStallman never gives up.
- catacombs 7y agoHe probably doesn't know this is happening.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- retrac98 7y agoGood riddance.
- aortega 7y agoHe has endured this before, thing is, the guy's old, alone, and not in the best shape mentally, and this might get him.
- catacombs 7y agoStallman resigned from MIT and FSF. Looks like he didn't endure.
- johnnyAghands 7y agoGetting a 404
- dang 7y agoFixed now.
- beatgammit 7y agoI think the problem here is that Stallman seems to value technical correctness over propriety, and doesn't seem to value political correctness at all. I get his point that using the term "assault" is probably incorrect, though it may be the correct term in some jurisdictions. The (usually unofficial) term I'd use is "statutory rape", which covers any nonforcible sexual activity between an adult and a minor (roughly paraphrased from Wikipedia [1]). So, using the term "assault" is technically incorrect in some jurisdictions, and that seems to be the point he was trying to make. That being said, it's not an important point to make at all, and it is absolutely valid to see it as completely insensitive and inappropriate for someone in his position. Stallman does this type of thing a lot, and perhaps it's time to have him take a less public role and pass the mantel to someone who is willing to follow the ever changing rules of considerate speech. Speaking with tact doesn't limit the ability for the FSF to spread its message; to the contrary, it can only help. I feel both sides here are in the wrong. The author made a big deal over what I (and likely many others) see as another of Stallman's eccentric rants, but then again, we probably shouldn't continue giving him a pass just because of his contributions. Maybe he needs to talk to whomever Linus Torvalds spoke with about being more careful with public speech. I appreciate the edit the author made about being a bit hasty, and I'd also appreciate something similar from Stallman about his choice of arguments to involve himself in. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statutory_rape https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statutory_rape
- AndrewBissell 7y ago"nonforcible" is 100% bullshit in this context. A university professor in his 70s with liver spots on his bald pate who is "approached" by a 17 year old girl for sex on his rich buddy's island is knowingly participating in rape, full stop.
- sheldor 7y ago"Did I even really know who Richard Stallman was before those emails? To be honest, not really" Oh, dear
- AndrewBissell 7y agoImagine it, someone who works (possibly at some remove) with a set of tools without necessarily engaging in a deep, intensive study of the figureheads who led in their creation. And then to engage with the written words of that figurehead as if they were on some sort of equal footing. The gall!
- aortega 7y ago>"Did I even really know who Richard Stallman was before those emails? To be honest, not really" She auto-disqualifies herself. At least she's honest.
- kentrado 7y agoFirst, he didn’t even give the typical, whiney, ‘he’s accused but not convicted’ defense. No, Stallman went much further than that. I find it curious that she talks about this as if it is a bad thing. The most sensible thing is to wait until conviction to pass judgement. Why is that whiney?
- AndrewBissell 7y ago> The most sensible thing is to wait until conviction to pass judgement. This is the most sensible thing if you're a juror on a case. Otherwise, judgment may be called for long before a trial even starts, particularly when it comes to dead men (or participants in an elite criminal network which operates above the law) who will never even be brought to trial.
- rumanator 7y ago> This is the most sensible thing if you're a juror on a case. No, it's the most sensible thing in each and every single case, whether you're a juror or just someone reading the news. Let the pitchforks remain in the past, and let's enjoy the benefits of living in a civilized society where rule of law and demonstration of guilt is what dictates punishment.
- AndrewBissell 7y agoDo you honestly believe moral judgments of historical or famous figures have to be suspended in every case where word of their misdeeds emerged after their deaths and they were never brought to trial?
- rumanator 7y agoIt's painfully obvious that "moral judgement" should not be mandated by a random blogger with an axe to grind and desperately seeking the spotlight to signal his/her own personal moral virtues to the world. Everything else is the equivalent to grasping at pitchforks.
- ubu7737 7y ago"I'm writing this because I'm too angry to work." This is a poor premise. I give it a pass because RMS was probably in a similar pique when he sent his ridiculous email. But elevating this conversation (and actually ditching RMS) will require calm.
- badatshipping 7y agoI've noticed that people who write posts like this like to quote their subject, and then go, oh my, how shocking! what an appalling thing to say! without addressing the thing that was said, which in this case was (among other things): “I think it is morally absurd to define “rape” in a way that depends on minor details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years old or 17.” He was responding to a student, who said "Giuffre was 17 at the time, this makes it rape in the Virgin Islands." He was addressing her specific point. He brought up the 17-18 thing because the student herself specified Giuffre's age as the condition of her being raped. Like, if the student had said "Giuffre was raped because she was coerced against her will," that'd be different. But you can't yourself bring up the technical definition of rape to make your point, then get mad when other people point out that the technical definition makes no sense. If what you really want say is that rape is wrong because it's wrong, just say that! Of course, the author cares about none of this, because what Stallman said was "problematic." What does that even mean, by the way? This whole post consists of the author repeatedly asserting that various things Stallman said were problematic without explaining why. This brings me to my next point. Here's an article about "tact filters," a term describing how different people deal with the issue of tact: http://www.mit.edu/~jcb/tact.html http://www.mit.edu/~jcb/tact.html People like Stallman don't get offended, so they assume other people won't either. People who do get offended try hard not to offend others, and expect the same courtesy. These two groups of people have difficulty getting along. Neither point of view is invalid, in the sense that both sides get along extremely well with other people who are like them. But people with outward tact filters happen to be the majority, so Stallman gets seen as the bad guy. But I could imagine an alternative universe where inward-tact-filter nerds were the majority, and people like this author were expected to e.g. have the mental resilience to not let other people's words hijack her emotions. So I guess I'm offended that people like Stallman are made to feel bad for being who they are, just because they're a minority.
- krapp 7y ago>I'm offended that people like Stallman are made to feel bad for being who they are, just because they're a minority. Richard Stallman is not a minority, either at MIT or in programming culture.
- krapp 7y agoNo one is going to remove Richard Stallman. That would be akin to removing God from Mount Sinai. Who are we to criticize the Prophet of Free Software? His belief that children can give valid consent for sexual acts and his "skepticism" of "the claim that voluntarily [sic] pedophilia harms children" has been documented and well known for years, no one cares. If anything, his pro-pedophilia views have probably helped normalize a general lack of concern over pedophilia and sexual abuse in programming and internet culture, and might have contributed to the acceptance of people like Epstein at MIT. He's Richard Stallman after all... if he thinks sexual assault isn't a big deal, it's probably isn't, right?
- 401kguy 7y ago> No one is going to remove Richard Stallman. This comment sure did not age well.
- krapp 7y ago401kguy 18 hours ago [dead] [-] > No one is going to remove Richard Stallman. This comment sure did not age well. You're right, woof. I stand behind the rest of it, though.
- 401kguy 7y agoI just came across a line in Bushnell's reflection (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21006252 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21006252): > RMS’s mere presence on the scene in this way has served to make it harder to deal with other cases of bad leaders’ bad behavior. which echoes what you said: > his pro-pedophilia views have probably helped normalize a general lack of concern over pedophilia and sexual abuse in programming and internet culture
- kemonocode 7y agoSo how many more people have to die before we finally understand cancel culture is an abysmally bad idea? Not that I believe RMS is in immediate danger, but for anyone else who's more weak-willed, a mean-spirited article like this would be a career-ending, if not life-ending matter.
- AndrewBissell 7y agoWon't someone please think of the rape apologists? If RMS is as thoroughly divorced from social needs and considerations as his defenders are claiming then I'm not sure why we should expect, say, removal from the FSF to have any psychological impact on him whatsoever.
- ignoranceprior 7y agoSerious question, not a gotcha: Who has died as a result of cancel culture? Are you only using the words "die" and "life-ending" figuratively here, or is there actual precedent?
- backpropaganda 7y agoAlec Holowka was a game dev who committed suicide recently after allegations of sexual assault by ex-girlfriend Zoe Quinn. He was the developer behind Night in the Woods. The NitW studio said they've cut ties with him after Quinn's allegations.
- dymk 7y agoQuinn's accusations of Alec and the accusations against RMS are very clearly different. These are words coming from RMS himself, not hearsay.
- anigbrowl 7y agoIf you think 'cancel culture' is bad wait until you hear about sexual assault trauma.
- DoreenMichele 7y agoThis is a really hard topic to discuss. It has a tendency to become a he said/she said argument space where women line up on one side to bash what a man is saying and men line up on the other side to defend the man. That just deepens the "gender war" conflict. I didn't read entirely through the whole thing. It's not my cup of tea. I don't know how we get to a better place, but attempts to dissect a piece written by a woman who is extremely upset, so upset she can't function and feels compelled to publicly vent, is probably not it.
- quotemstr 7y agoPeople like the author of this article --- people who haven't accomplished a hundredth of what RMS has --- have power only because reasonable people fear that they'll be next if they don't join the mob. You don't have to be afraid. We don't have to put up with cancel culture. All that's necessary is to just ignore these angry articles and focus on meaningful work, treating anger as a distraction.
- abeger 7y agoThey have power because people fear that they'll be the next one whose sexual assault is publicly written off by "luminaries of the industry".
- aortega 7y agoObviously you would fear that, Stallman is being called a pedophile and his jobs is in danger, all without a single iota of proof, just because the internet mob made him his next target.
- dymk 7y agoStallman isn't being called a pedophile. He's being called somebody who defends rape and child trafficking, because that's literally what the words he's written attempt to justify. If you want proof, go read the email thread where he lays out in plain words how he thinks that the 17 year old was actually consenting to being trafficked.
- mtrower 7y agoYou are referring to this CSAIL mailing list excerpt? https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6405929-09132019142056-0001.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6405929-091320191420... Please show me the plain words, in the email thread which I have read in its entirety, where he says a 17 year old was consenting to being trafficked. He has asserted in this thread: * that sexual assault is too broad and vague a term; we should use narrower terms to more concretely describe actions, so as not to rise to mis-impressions (this is primary idea). * that he thinks it is morally absurd to define rape based on location of occurrence. * that he thinks it is morally absurd to define rape based on a 1 year age difference. * that Minsky may not have been aware that Giuffre was being coerced (in his opinion, the most plausible scenario was that Minsky was not aware). * that Giuffre herself did not, to his knowledge, level accusations at Minsky (she implicated him in a deposition against Epstein, but did not give details). He has not (AFAICT) asserted in this thread: * that Minsky did not commit a crime. * that Minsky's actions were entirely moral. * that Epstein's actions were neither criminal nor immoral. * that a 17 year old was consenting to being trafficked.
- aortega 7y agoIt's interesting that Stallman very likely left those weird pedophilia comments on purpose, like a canary to measure how much freedom he has.